Tillage farmer: Suspension of Straw Incorporation Measure could wipe '25% of my income'
Worth It Is Hectare, For While Is €250 Per The Oilseed Payment Barley, Per For Wheat, Rye, Rape And Hectare Oats, €150
The suspension of the Straw Incorporation Measure (SIM) has the potential to wipe "at least 25% of my income for the coming year", a tillage farmer has said.
Agriculture Minister Charlie McConalogue this week announced his intention to seek a deferral of the 2024 SIM from the European Commission, in light of concerns around fodder availability this year.
“Last winter depleted national reserves of straw and resulted in very little availability in the early months of this year. At present, although growth is improving, the indications are that fodder is still behind where we would like to be," Mr McConalogue said.
Under this measure, farmers receive a payment for chopping straw and incorporating it into the soil.
For oats, rye, wheat, and barley, €250 is the payment per hectare, while it is worth €150 per hectare for oilseed rape.
Don Somers, a tillage farmer in Oilgate, Co Wexford, said that a suspension of the measure would have a "massive impact" for many tillage farms, and said incorporating straw into his soil has environmental benefits by putting carbon and "unused nutrients back into the soil", reducing the amount of phosphorus and potassium he has to apply the following year.
He said the effect that chopping straw and incorporating it has had on his soil - "it has improved the organic matter, which also improves the soil ability to utilise nutrients that are already there".
Mr Somers, a Teagasc Signpost farmer who grows a range of cereals on 450 acres, said that "one of the main focuses" on the farm is "how efficiently we can use the nutrients that we do apply".
"We use a lot of different technologies. We map all our yields so that we can identify the high-yielding and low-yielding parts of the fields, and then we do soil tests according to those yield maps and then apply the right amount of fertiliser to match the crops' potential to yield," he told this week's Energy and Farm Diversification Show at Gurteen College.
"So rather than over-applying on an area that just can't yield or under-applying on a place that has the potential to yield more, we try to tailor the nutrients applied to the crops.
"As soon as the crop is harvested, we try to establish a cover crop to mop up any nutrients that are left behind - so rather than having them lost into the watercourse or the atmosphere, a cover crop holds onto those nutrients for the following crop.
"We try to use the nutrients we do apply as efficiently as possible."
He said he has over 97 acres of cereals put in for the SIM, and if this is removed, "effectively, that's €9,700 of income that has gone from my farm - I expect that to make up a minimum of 25% of my income for the coming year, so it's not just an environmental hit".
"By suspending the scheme it's not even going to solve any potential fodder crisis," Mr Somers feels.
He said that farmers would have planted oilseed rape for the measure, expecting to receive the payment for incorporating it, and "the majority of that oilseed rape crop would have been sprayed with a herbicide AstroKerb", which now cannot be used for livestock purposes.
"Even though those farmers won't be paid to incorporate that straw, they're still going to have to incorporate that straw, there's no benefit to any livestock farmer in a fodder crisis," he said.
According to Mr Somers, farmers can see "absolutely no benefit" to scrapping the scheme "when the harvest has already started".
Farmers outlined their frustration with the proposal to the minister as he attended the Energy and Farm Diversification Show this week.
Delegates of the Irish Farmers' Association and the Irish Grain Growers Group met with Mr McConalogue at the event, telling him that a suspension would be "totally unacceptable and that it must be overturned immediately".
The organisations told him that "farmers made decisions to plant crops based on a scheme announced by the minister. He is now withdrawing the scheme after the harvest has started".
"If the minister can do this to tillage farmers, he can do it to any farmer at the stroke of a pen. It will not be accepted."
The organisations said that the minister has agreed to meet with them again next week, however, farmers will be harvesting over the weekend "in a complete vacuum".
"This is causing huge stress for growers and their families.
"If the minister continues with this unilateral approach, the Taoiseach must intervene to overturn the decision without delay," the organisations said in a joint statement on Friday.
The tillage chairman of the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers Association Gavin Carberry has said that tillage farmers must receive payment for baling straw if the measure is cancelled.
“Many tillage farmers were relying on this payment, but now they find themselves not only losing out on the payment, but also facing significant fertiliser bills next year due to not incorporating straw," Mr Carberry said.
He said last year was "disastrous" for tillage farmers, with 80% not able to clear their bills.
“This year is shaping up to be just as grim as most spring cereals sown in May will not be harvested until late September. The short days will then increase the risk of the crop not being saved at all, potentially a repeat of last year," the tillage chairman added.
